


I’ll Risk It

by remedialpotions



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Deathly Hallows missing moment, F/M, Idiots in Love, Mutual Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-10
Updated: 2020-10-10
Packaged: 2021-03-08 05:00:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,480
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26930038
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/remedialpotions/pseuds/remedialpotions
Summary: "You'd really say that I'm your cousin?""Yeah," he said at once, sounding surprised she’d brought it up. "I mean, if it'd keep you off that Muggleborn registration list, of course I would."
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Ron Weasley
Comments: 17
Kudos: 81





	I’ll Risk It

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to all the jokers on the HPRomione discord (let me know if you want a link to join!) for inspiring me to write this and for always joining me in gushing over these two idiots in love. I had a little bout of writer’s block and feels so good to be back at it!

"So..." Hermione couldn't quite bring herself to meet his eyes, instead picking at a loose thread in the sofa cushion. "About what you said before..."

"Uh huh..." replied Ron warily from his seat at the opposite end of the sofa.

"You'd really say that I'm your cousin?"

"Yeah," he said at once, sounding surprised she’d brought it up. "I mean, if it'd keep you off that Muggleborn registration list, of course I would."

The events of the day had left a strange, uneasy mood over Number Twelve, Grimmauld Place. While it felt like progress to know where the locket most likely was, the fact remained that accessing Dolores Umbridge (let alone robbing her of jewelry) would be no easy feat, and Harry's row with Lupin had incited a faint churning in Hermione's stomach that she thought might never stop.

They were alone together now, she and Ron, as they often were these days. Still (understandably) bad-tempered, Harry had stalked off to bed early, but Hermione's mind was racing with everything she'd learned, and sleep seemed very, very far off. And as was custom lately, wherever she was... there was Ron right beside her.

Hermione raised her eyes, meeting his gaze with her own. He'd been so resolute, so quick to leap to this resolution and so determined to stick to it, but she just couldn't abide it. "You'd be lying to the Ministry," Hermione pointed out. "At this point, that's basically lying to Voldemort."

"Voldemort doesn't scare me," said Ron flippantly, though at Hermione's raised brows, he relented, "all right, he does actually, but what else are we going to do? They're not making a Muggleborn Registration Commission so they can send you lot Christmas cards, are they?"

"I know they’re after us, I'm just saying, it's not a good idea to blatantly lie like that."

"But what do you think'll happen if you end up getting questioned and you tell them the truth?" Ron went on. "Voldemort’s just going to thank us for our honesty and send us on our way?"

"Of course not, but we're already targets, and your family-" Her voice lowered, softening. "Your family is already being watched. He's the one pulling all the strings at the Ministry, and with him in power, you could end up in Azkaban, or worse - who even knows what this new regime will do. I put nothing past them."

"It's not like they can kick me out of school," said Ron with a barely-suppressed smirk. "I'm already not going back." The smirk morphed into a grin - warm and wide and just a little lopsided, and Hermione's irritation dulled at the edges. More and more lately, she just couldn't help it; there was something in the way he looked at her that made her want to give up everything she had, just for him. "I know that's your worst fear."

Of course, then he had to go and say something ridiculous like that, and she couldn't help rolling her eyes at him. "It's not, actually, and I wish you'd take this seriously-"

"I do!" he exclaimed, sitting up straight, hands flung into the air. "That's exactly why I want to do this, because of how seriously I take it."

"But it would never work," she said, desperate for this point to sink in, for him to realize that he was essentially flinging himself in harm's way. "Even if you taught me every single name on your family tree for the past thousand years, nobody would ever believe that we're related."

"No?"

He was clearly determined to argue until the bitter end, so Hermione settled in, shifting around on the sofa until she was sitting cross-legged, facing him fully.

"I don't look anything like a Weasley or a Prewett," she said, recalling the sea of redheads at Bill and Fleur's wedding several lifetimes ago. "And I think your Aunt Muriel hates me."

Ron snorted. "Yeah, she hates me too. That actually makes it  _ more _ believable. What else have you got?"

He seemed to be enjoying this now. His eyes bright and expectant, he folded his arms across his chest, fists tucked under the lean muscle of his biceps, and Hermione allowed her eyes to linger there and drink in the scarred and freckled skin. There was one huge, glaring reason that she did not want to claim to be related to him in any capacity, but perhaps now was not the ideal time to mention it. 

Because if she did mention it - if she explained that she wanted to do all sorts of things with Ron that cousins were really, really not supposed to do - then she'd be laying it all out there. She'd be saying the unspoken. And if she did, and things proceeded the way she hoped and expected they might, then they'd forget all about Umbridge, and the locket, and perhaps the war entirely, and they couldn't afford to lose sight of any of it.

Best to stick to what she knew best: logic, and reason, and facts.

"They'd be able to disprove it in a second anyway," Hermione went on. "I can't just be your long-lost cousin who pops up out of nowhere, there would need to be birth records. I'd need a whole fake family."

"My family's huge, if you hadn't noticed," continued Ron, "they'd never find time to interrogate everyone. We'd find someone, maybe we could say you're related to that cousin of my Mum's who's an accountant-" His eyes widened in excitement. "Yeah, actually, that makes sense, because then you'd have been raised as a Muggle, and you'd think you're Muggleborn-" He beamed at her, even as something akin to terror settled itself firmly in Hermione's stomach. "This could actually work!"

"No, it won't!" Hermione blurted out; Ron blinked in surprise. "I'm sorry, but it simply wouldn't work, and you'd be thrown in Azkaban, or tortured, or - or-"

"Then I'll risk it," said Ron, infuriatingly calm. "If it'll keep you safe, I'll risk it."

"You'll risk Azkaban," Hermione challenged, skepticism heavy in her words. "You'll risk living the rest of your life in a concrete cell with a Dementor?"

He nodded. "If it'll keep you safe."

Frustration flared through her. A lump formed in her throat, blocking all of those unspoken things that she thought maybe now she should just go ahead and say. At least that way he'd know that losing him would crush her, that she couldn't allow him to demolish his own life just for her, and that if it came down to it, she would sacrifice herself for him every single time.

"But it's - I'm sorry, but it's a terrible idea-"

"So am I supposed to do nothing?" Ron fired back. "Look, I don't like it, but being pureblood is like, my only advantage in all of this, so I've got to use it-"

"Not like this!" She pinched her lips together, forcing out a long, steadying breath through her nose. "We're already in hiding. They can't question me if they don't know where I am."

"They might find us, Snape's been here before so he'll know where to look, and - and what about when we start going to the Ministry? What if you get caught?"

" _ If _ that happens, then I'll figure it out, but I'm not putting you or your family on the hook-"

"No, you can't just 'figure it out'!" He sounded just as desperate as Hermione felt now, and his ears had gone a deep, smoldering crimson. "Look, if something happens to you, and I could have stopped it..." He broke off, rubbed his hands down his face, and looked at her. 

Really looked at her. And this time his eyes weren't achingly earnest, or alight with the thrill of an impending argument, or shining with warmth and affection. They were pleading with her now, asking for this not just for her sake, but for his own as well. He needed to know he was doing everything he could to protect her.

The problem was, she needed to know she was protecting him too.

"We'll stay in hiding," she said weakly, looking down at her own hands, too afraid to meet his eyes and see the fear and disappointment she knew would be there. "We'll keep fighting, and Harry will win, and... and then we won't have to worry about it anymore."

"Yeah," Ron nodded, though he sounded glum. "Yeah, fine. We won't do it."

"And besides," Hermione added, hoping to add some levity to the situation, "you don't really want to pretend we're related, do you?"

Silently - and they'd gotten good at silent conversations lately - she pleaded with him to understand her meaning, but if he'd caught on, he didn't let it show. 

Instead, he just shrugged. He didn't even look desperate anymore now, just sad. Defeated. 

"Like I said... I will if it'll keep you safe."

  
  
  
  



End file.
